>> wonderful to see people rising up. >> the number of subscriptions to the "washington post" and "new york times" goes through the roof. the number of charitable contributions to the american civil liberties union goes through the roof. >> across the world, it is not happening and makes it more important that we are out there fighting. -- t's an essential part >> you can watch every winning student cam documentary online at studentcam.org. >> on thursday, president trump met with members of his administration to discuss investment in other opportunities for improving

economically distressed communities. the president also answered a few questions from reporters about trade with china and his threat to close the u.s.-mexico border. from the white house, this is half an hour. president trump: thank you very much. i'm thrilled to welcome everyone to the very first meeting of the white house opportunity and revitalization council. the opportunity and revitalization council is a very important event in the white house. we have been working long and hard on getting this up and running. the new council will coordinate efforts across the entire federal government to deliver jobs, investment and growth to america's underserved and they are underserved communities. and all over the country we have areas thatr i guess you could say are not treated properly and

they are indeed underserved. we are joined by many members of my cabinet, secretary ben carson. he leads this very important initiative. thank you very much, ben. i appreciate it. not been easy to do. also joining us the council's executive director, scott turner. he is a former nfl turner and -- player and state legislator and a businessman, a leader in his church and community. scott, thank you for doing a great job and hopefully your results will be seen. that's when i'm going to thank you. i appreciate it. the council focuses its efforts on economically distressed communities across the country including opportunity zones which are up and running doing incredibly well beyond expectation, which we are designated by our nation's governors under a crucial

provision of our new tax cuts. that was a part of what we got approved with the tax cut. and i don't know that people talked about it, but it was very important. we are providing massive tax incentives to create jobs and opportunities where they are needed the most. this is all throughout the country. this council will further leverage federal resources and authorities to support these communities however possible. we will work to streamline regulations, include education, promote affordable housing, reduce crime and expand jobs and skill training for americans all throughout our country. our actions will directly improve the lives of countless low-income americans. it's pretty much aimed at that. together, we can lift up every forgotten community. and we talked about the forgotten men and women, and a lot of people were forgotten in this country and unleash the boundless potential of our

people. i look forward to hearing all about the incredible progress being made and i would like to start with ben carson who is doing a terrific job at h.u.d. we appreciate it. the secretary: we are thankful for your leadership. this whole thing came out of the 2017 tax cuts and jobs bill. that's where opportunity zones were invented and they provide an opportunity for people to take unrealized capital gains and investment into the neglected communities of our country. and some people have criticized this and said, it's just a mechanism for rich people to get richer. the fact of the matter is, rich people are going to take their money and will invest it any way.

having them invest in areas that have traditionally been neglected. because we have this, 13 different agencies, federal entities involved in using all of their influence, amalgamating that, we have synergy and we can focus, we can target and coordinate in such a way federal programs will have their maximum impact. the proof in the putting is going to be, we will see these areas revitalized. we haven't even come out with all the rules and regulations where money has been invested. i was in a foundry in st. louis last week. in mississippi, there was a abandonedat was because of the opportunities own. revitalizeve they

-- it is not talking about the rhetoric. factions, howcal much you need us. we are just going to show people what can happen when we direct resources at taking care of problems. all of these agencies are dedicated to making sure the men and women in this country will be forgotten. >> thank you, mr. president. appreciate your vision and leadership crating the white house counsel. i wish sharing, to be here with ,everal members of my family coming out of what we call

opportunity zones in distressed communities. this is close to my heart and the team we have assembled here not just at our table but are going to assist along the way. i have been blessed to play on a lot of teams throughout my career. but this has to be the greatest team that i have been involved with. because we have the opportunity to make a generational impact and for that, i'm grateful. thank you. >> thank you very much. we have tremendous faith and your leadership. you are an outstanding young man. you are still a young man. i'm little bit older than you. but we have tremendous confidence in you, scott. would you like to say a few words? >> thank you, mr. president for hosting us today. we look forward to working with

this council. and taking innovative steps to encourage private investment in the zones and our economic development administration and minority business development agency working to direct the funds where this is supposed to go. specifically, e.d.a. has already issued a notice of funding opportunity for public works and economic adjustment assistance programs to make all entities within the qualified opportunity zones generally available for e.d.a. funds. those will supplement the funding in the opportunity zone program itself. as we look to the future, we anticipate that state and local communities will take advantage of this opportunity. part of the process will include finding new and innovative ways to communicate the opportunity zone programs to state and local leaders and to potential investors. since fiscal year 2018, e.d.a.

has already invested in 16 small opportunity zone projects. and these will help make the zones more attractive to investors in the tax-oriented program. i look forward to discussing how to leverage private investment at future meetings. our minority group development agency is planning opportunity summits in a number of cities throughout the country to reach that community. first one was held last month in philadelphia and had 189 attendees. so this tremendous interest and enthusiasm including some of the very storm ravaged areas such as north florida. florida has 427 opportunity zones and the state economic development team has now agreed to plan the rollout every -- of the opportunity zones as

a master tool to encourage investment in those communities. mississippi and other states are doing similar things. so it has a lot of momentum. trump: how about the great larry kudlow. markets went up today. that's great. mostly up. >> only as good as my last trade. just briefly to summarize. this will help use of tax incentives and deregulation. we use private investment capital to help spread the prosperity where it joins every nook and cranny of the economy. that is the key. every single of the economy will benefit from this as you rebuild the overall economy and that is a terrific thing and we have to

promote it and message it and do what secretary carson says. scott, you are a great american. did you play for the new york giants? redskins, denver broncos and san diego chargers. the council representatives of china are here. they are going to be buying a lot of product from us for you farmers. do you have anything to say? >> 40% of these economic zones are in rural areas, mr. president. usda has a prime objective in trying to raise them as well. i would submit to you that this may be the sleeper provision of your tax cuts. we have already seen the growth of g.d.p. and jobs and employment and economic prosperity, but this

may be the generational provision of that that many people have ignored. i look forward working with this group to make sure it happens, not just for today and your administration but in the future raising these communities. thank you. >> mr. president, in the energy sector and i want to -- i get a cross purpose going on here. earlier in the week, you had a great event here at the white house on first step that you pushed through congress and signed into law. and to these prison reform re-entry programs that are going to be able to bring people that because of the program that you championed and that you passed on the first step to give these people coming out of prison, the opportunity to go into an opportunity zone. if the department of energy, because of what we're seeing and the growth and energy industry, a truck driver that need truck

drivers in louisiana or over in the permian basin, those truck drivers being able to shift over from a year ago being in prison through one of these rancher programs into an opportunity zone, making $100,000 a year, you talk about a transformation for a family, that's what we are looking at here. i worked with this man. scott turner is huge. president trump: i wish we got more media coverage on the whole thing we are doing with criminal justice reform. for whatever reason, they don't like that image with me helping people getting out of prison. they don't like that image of trump. they didn't cover it very much, which is unfair because they cover other things. look at the media. look at all of them.

that one they chose not to cover too much. i feel happy about it. criminal justice reform and because of the great economy, people getting out of prison are really, really for the first time in the history of our country, they are getting jobs and doing a fantastic job, for the most part. some problems. you have problems with everybody, but they are doing a phenomenal job. employers are really happy. so perhaps you people can cover that, because that is an important subject. the important thing is that the employers are so happy with what's taking place. it's an incredible thing that is happening. elaine chao. >> at the department of 10nsportation, we have grants. $2.3 billion and incorporating the principles of the opportunity zones into these grants. so recipients will think more about these grants and how to incorporate the opportunity zones into what they are doing.

president trump: you are doing a great job. >> there are 35 million americans living in these opportunity zones. the unemployment rate is on average 1 1/2 times the national level. so this is an opportunity for all of them to find jobs, but also an opportunity for us to grow our economy, because we have one million more open jobs right now than individuals looking for jobs. so as with other agencies, we are adding points to all our grants where we're legally able to do so to focus on work development opportunities on opportunity zones. i want to highlight two examples. you mentioned criminal justice reform. one example, our efforts on the re-entry, providing work force development dollars to individuals that are re-entering. we've added preference points on those. this is a wonderful opportunity

for individuals leaving prison to learn skills, to hold a job and those investors that are going to look to these opportunity zones are going to want to know that there are individuals that have the skills to actually work at these factories that are going to be built. so across the board, we're doing it for re-entry programs, homeless veterans, we have veterans that are homeless and for whatever reasons, whether it's addiction issues, whether it's not having the right skill, we have development programs for them. we're adding these preference points to our programs and we're focusing on these zones. president trump: from the founding of our country, until a year ago, this really started happening a year ago, people et -- getting out of prison couldn't get jobs, and now they've got choices.

we've got choice for our vets, that's a different kind of choice. we've got choice, they have choice now in terms of jobs, never happened before, never happened in our country's history. and again the employers, the feedback has been extraordinary. not just good but extraordinary. i've spoken to a couple that said, why didn't i do this years ago? but they couldn't get jobs so they'd end up back in prison. they were forced to do other things that weren't so good in some cases and they'd end up back in prison. this is the first time that's happened since the founding of our country. a lot of it has to do with a great economy. a lot of it has to do with a mind set we're helping to create. you're doing a fantastic job, all of you. such an important thing. andrew? please. >> thank you, mr. president, for your leadership on the opportunity zone, and secretary carson's and mr. turner's. e.p.a. will announce grants to revitalize struggling

communities. we've included the opportunity zone designation as a tiebreaking criteria in the process. this means we're helping them take advantage of our many grant and loan programs. we distributed to cities with opportunity zones and we announced availability of $6 billion in water infrastructure loans. we gave a loan to the city of baltimore and tomorrow i'll with in miami to announce another loan to help with their water infrastructure and finally, we're helping struggling areas meet their nonattainment air quality standards. when they're in nonattainment for air quality it takes away from the businesses they can attract to their season. -- city. it's allowed cleveland to attract new business and expand businesses there. president trump: i like cleveland.

you know why? we had very good day in cleveland, couple of days. david, please. >> mr. president with the leadership of this group we've worked very hard to focus on some of our native american communities, there's lots of opportunities that can attract investment there with this as a supporting effort. also, small rural communities that are surrounded by federal lands. this can be attractive for critical mineral developments and other opportunities. we have some grant programs designed to attract that russell doing great. -- >> doing great. thank you. >> opportunity zones hold great promise for education and work force development. opportunity zones, one fifth of the residents do not have a high school diploma and many of those that do are ill prepared for the careers available. to bring specific areas we can

be most helpful in is the development of charter schools. currently 70% of opportunity zones don't have a charter school. we can help private investors, help with facilities and we will incentivize grant competitions to help encourage that. also career and technical education development for facility equipment technology. and then this partners very well, opportunity zones partner very well with our education freedom scholarships initiative to really provide families more options and opportunities right in their backyard. so i'm very thankful nor -- for this opportunity work on this with the group here and for your leadership on this . >> thank you, i appreciate it. this is a very important day. i wish everybody good luck. in particular, scott, i have no doubt you'll do a very fantastic job. thank you very much, everybody. [applause]

>> mr. president, what authority does the i.r.s. president trump: we're having a big meeting this afternoon. i think you folks are going to be at it for a little while at least. the vice premiere is here, lots of top people from china, they want to make a deal. it's got to be a great deal. look, we've been losing, over many years, 4-5, $600 billion a year, we're losing a few years ago 200 routinely to china. we can't do that. it is going to be a great deal. if it's not a great deal, we're not doing it. it's going well. top officials are here. and we're very well along on the deal. it's a complex deal, very big deal. one of the biggest deals ever made, maybe the biggest deal ever made.

it will be a great deal for our farmers. technology, intellectual property theft, everything is covered. there's not a thing that's not covered. we could have made a quickie but we're in a very good position. our economy is way up. china is not way up. we're going to make a very good deal or we're not going to make a deal at all. i think it looks like the deal is moving along. we're going to say hello to the media sometimes after 2:00. thank you, everybody. a lot of good things are happening with mexico. mexico understands that we're going to close the border or i am going to tariff the cars. one or the other. probably settle for the tariffs. that'll be a very powerful incentive because mexico has the strongest immigration laws anywhere in the world. they don't have courts like we do. we have a stupid system of

courts, it's the craziest thing in the world. we could be the only country that has it. you put a foot on the property, put a foot into the united go get congratulations, perry mason to represent you. end up with a court case. and then they release you and you come back four, five years later, but nobody comes back. 2% come back. not so smart ones come back. it's the most ridiculous system anyone's ever seen. we have catch and release and we have chain migration where somebody comes in and brings the whole family, bring them all, your grandparents york brothers, -- your brothers, your sisters, your cousins, craziest thing i've ever seen. put in by democrats. and the democrats are going to straighten it out. if they don't straighten it out, and i predicted this. i hate to see it but at least i can say i was right. i told everybody. this is -- you have a national emergency at our border. and nobody even talks about drugs. the drugs that are flowing in.

so for the last four days, you actually have covered to it a very minor extent, mexico has been capturing people and bringing them back to their countries. at their southern border. they've been taking people under their very powerful laws, they have the right to do it, and bringing them back to where they came from. that's about three days now, i guess, frankly since they heard i was going to close the border. before i close the border, if mexico and -- we love mexico. we love the country of mexico. we have two problems. we have the fact that they allow people to pour in to our country, we have to stop them, border patrol has been incredible, i.c.e. has been incredible. law enforcement has been incredible. the other problem is drugs. massive amounts of -- most of the drug, much of the drugs coming into our country come through the southern border. in all different ways.

much of it where we don't have walls the wall is under , construction, large sections, we're going to be meeting, i think on friday, at a piece of the wall we've completed. a lot of it is being built right now. a lot of it is being signed up right now by different contractors. it's moving along very nicely. but we need the wall. but we need lots of other things. so we need help from mexico. if mexico doesn't give the help, that's ok. we're going to tariff their cars coming into the united states. the other thing is because mexico is such a big source of drugs, unfortunately, unfortunately, now we have china sending fentanyl to mexico so it can be delivered into the united states. not acceptable. so the second aspect of it is, which you haven't heard before is that if the drugs don't stop, mexico can stop them if they want, we're going to tariff the cars. the cars are very big. if that doesn't work we're going to close the border.

i think that'll work. that's massive numbers of dollars. so if we don't see people apprehended and brought back to their country, if we see these massive caravans coming up to our country right through mexico, coming right through mexico, like nothing, buses are even given to them. last three days it hasn't happened since i said we're closing the border. the only thing frankly better but less drastic than closing the border is to tariff the cars coming in. i will do it. just like -- you know i will do it. i don't play games. i'll do it. so we're doing it to stop people. we're going to give them a one-year warning. and if the drugs don't stop, or largely stop, we're going to put tariffs on mexico and products in particular cars. the whole ballgame is cars. it's the big ballgame. with many countries it's cars. and if that doesn't stop the drugs, we close the border.

because mexico last year, and for many years, just like china except china numbers are even bigger. i don't blame china and i don't blame mexico, they can get i a-- away with it. i blame the people who used to sit in this seat, i'm not just talking about president obama, i'm talking about many presidents they should have done something about it. so if mexico doesn't do what they can do very easily, apprehend these people coming in, and they can do it in a much more humane fashion, why should they walk up 2,000 miles and then be brought back? they can stop them right at their southern border, right where they come into mexico. they have unbelievable immigration laws where they have toe the right to do it. the most powerful in the world, as good as you can have and they're going to do it. if they don't do it, we'll tax the cars. if that doesn't work we'll close the borders. we're also going to do something

having to do with tariffs on drugs. because not only are hundreds of thousands of lives a year being ruined in our country, but numbers of people -- people are dying like you wouldn't believe. we lose one military personnel and it's a front page story. and yet we have 100,000 people, people don't even know the number. they say 77,000, they say 72,000, any number they give, you can guarantee to raise it. and if the drugs don't stop we're going to put tariffs on them. it also costs our country at least $500 billion. through our southern border. so we will put tariffs on if they don't apprehend and ultimately we're going to give a period of time, but if in a queer from now, drugs can't to pour in, we're going to put tariffs on them.

now we have a deal. usmca, it's all done. they're going to have to live wit. ok. they're going to have to live with it. i'm not trying to be unfair, they're going to have to live with it. the usmca is a great deal for everybody. but this is more important to me than the usmca. so they have to live with it. thank you very much. [all speaking at once] >> i will 31 thing, it is a great deal. if they don't pass it it's purely political. everybody wants to see it pass. but we'll see. whatever they want to do is ok with me. thank you. come on, guys.

>> coming of the life and friday, joe biden will speak at a conference for electrical workers. then the head of the atomic energy agency on nuclear guards. and a discussion about combating isis in syria and iraq. association lawyers holds its policy conference. that gets underway at 8:45 eastern. on c-span3 at 9:00, a look at how the domestic political climate is affecting foreign policy. >> the only thing we have to fear is fear itself. ask what you can do for your

country. >> the presidents. .he best and worst interviews with noted historians. explore the life events that shaped our leaders. by public affairs. copy.n preorder your wherever books are sold. on thursday, the house voted to and assistance in yemen's civil war. 16 republicans voted in